Although Ian has climbed to the top of Snowdon several times in his life, he was quite keen to do it one last time. Depending on which route you choose it takes 6-8 hours there and back and luckily he decided it would be a bit too much given that I was then on my feet shooting 6 hours solid for the next two days.
Instead we decided to go by train and I was able to prebook a return trip on the Snowdon Mountain Railway at the extortionate price of £65. As the visitor centre at the top of the mountain was still closed, the train was only going three quarters of the way up and stopping for half hour at the unsheltered station (halt) of Clogwen; so a two hour round trip in all.
Luckily despite the forecast and the previous night's heavy rain, the day dawned bright and sunny and after breakfast pastries from Asda (turned out breakfast at the hotel was another COVID casualty) we set off early for the half hour drive to Llanberis.
A couple of snaps along the way.
Try as I might I couldn't persuade the staff to let me past the gates, nor would they open them - 'Elf N Safety Madam'
It's mostly grass, rocks and sheep
This family of swans was rushing to meet a lady who fed it daily, she'd also fed the cob since it was a cygnet and it happily ate from her hand.
We'd read that parking in Llanberis was particular difficult so allowed plenty of time. We saw a sign for All Day Snowdon Parking and drove into the small car park. There were plenty of spaces and so we paid the £6 and set off to find the station. It turned out that we'd parked near the Llanberis Lake Railway Station but in fact the other station was only a few 100 meters further along and when we got there the huge car park was rather full and charged £8 per day - result!
Our little two carriage train was called Katherine Jenkins (we also saw Bryn Terfel) and each carriage had been divided into segments by Perspex partitions. Each segment only carried 4 people although I'd guess in normal times 8-10 and as we were sharing with another couple we had to wear our masks all the time.
We were first in the queue to board so I checked with the guard as to which side afforded the best view and he recommended left going up and then swop over for coming down. Sadly all photos had to be taken through glass so are somewhat spoilt by the reflections.
The longest, but easiest walking route more or less follows the railway all the way to the top, so you get glimpses of walkers all along the track.
The weather at the top wasn't brilliant. I think this little hut was a rest stop for walkers (presumably closed at the moment).
The next train winding its way up.
The 30 min stop was soon over and luckily our fellow travellers had decided to continue to the top on foot so we were the only occupants of our compartment and therefore didn't have to wear our face masks - result. Going down the views in the other direction weren't much different and the reflections still as bad.
There are lots of ruined buildings dotted around
Once back at Llanberis Station we walked about 10 mins into the little town and bought a sandwich/drink which we ate down by Lake Padarn. Across the lake is the Dinorwic Slate Quarry (now a museum but we didn't visit) and you can see some of the "spoil" in front of this house opposite where we were sitting.
We'd asked directions in the mini supermarket how to get back to the waterfall we'd passed on the train and was told it was only about 10 mins to the top. A jolly lot longer than 10, more like 30, and it was really hot by then. This glade was beautiful and reminded me of Middle Earth.
There's always an idiot (standing on the right at the top of the falls)
We then walked back down and under the railway line to the bottom of the river
And then alongside in the cool shade to another vantage point.
We then drove randomly around the area admiring the views. Sheep farming is the main industry and one particularly small road Ian chose didn't have cattle grids but gates and we had to stop to open/shut 6 of them. It was a beautiful drive and luckily we didn't meet anything coming towards us. I don't think the beauty of the area really shows up in the photos unfortunately, especially as the skies are a bit flat.
Back on a more major road what we assumed to be a sports car club rally was going on. They all stopped in a line and let cars overtake then roared past us at high speed - not very clever as there were still sheep wandering on to the road.
Another gorgeous stone bridge, made all the more beautiful by the heather and gorse growing on the river bank.
Another scene from Middle Earth
Everywhere you look are little streams
These sheep had found lovely scratching place on a rocky outcrop and were taking it in turns.
I'm not sure why these crows sitting on a road side tickled me, they just did!
We then decided to head homewards via the coast. First stop was Portmerion where the 1960s TV series The Prisoner was filmed, although we knew it would be closed as it was gone 5pm but thought we might be able to see something of the village from the car. Access was via a long hydrangea lined avenue (Wales = water = lovely hydrangea) where we saw adverts for 2 course lunch at Castell Deudraeth and free entry to Portmerion for £20pp and given that entrance alone is £13 pp this seemed a good deal. We couldn't see anything of the village from the driveway and were soon at the entrance gate. The gatekeeper was very helpful and although as far as he knew the restaurant was fully booked until end September, he suggested as we were passing that we popped in and enquired about lunch on Monday. Sure enough they were fully booked but for some reason decided they could squeeze us in if we didn't mind eating at 2pm - that would suit us fine as we'd be fed for the journey home. The bonus was being a Monday the Government's Eat Out to Help Out scheme applied so it would only cost us £10pp for lunch and entrance to Port Merion - result.
From there we drove south to Harlech for a view of the castle which Ian remembered well from staying nearby. A difficult angle from close up and bad light from far off.
I was at least able to get a close up on a stone barn which I hope I can use later in a composite piece.
From there we headed back to the unglorious Crown only to find there was nowhere to park. We asked some of the lads hanging around and were told to park in some of the Asda spaces as the hotel rented 10 of them. Straight up to our room where we found it hadn't been made up. so we managed to find the lady we'd spied on the way in disappearing down a corridor and who we assumed worked there. She explained no servicing of the rooms because of Covid which was perfectly acceptable, however we should have been notified in advance and additional tea/coffee/milk supplies left and something more satisfactory than a hand towel to dry cups and saucers. I then fired off all the complaints we had about the place and that I would be contacting the management on our return to Kent as I believed in speaking directly with management rather than leaving negative comments on social media. Irene fully agreed with how badly everything was being handled and told us that the new owner was actually coming tomorrow so she'd pass on my comments. She then supplied us with the missing bath mat(s), offered more towels and showed us where the top-up hot drink supplies were.
We decided to order take-away pizza from a nearby outlet and although the staff barely spoke any English (or I would guess Welsh) we made ourselves understood and whilst the pizzas were cooking had a wander around town, but there wasn't a great deal to see and we couldn't find any other restaurants/pubs which looked OK for eating in tomorrow. Pizzas ready on our return, so back to the hotel and a glass of wine and some food and actually my tuna pizza was delicious. Neither of us particularly like eating with our fingers and knowing restaurants might be limited, I'd packed picnic plates, cutlery and glasses which came in very useful.
